THE ARTAUD AFFAIR-LE MONDE
Plea for resuscitating the drowned
Open letter (as form demands) to Jean-Louis Jeannelle* and Le Monde des livres. *Writer of the article “L’Affaire Artaud : journal ethnographique de Florence de Mèredieu : Artaud et les jésuites” (11 June 09)
THE BIG LOSERS : ARTAUD AND HIS READERS
As has always been the case in the past sixty years, there are two big losers in this Affair :
- Artaud and his work, which remain under control, under influence, with orthodox books that play into the hands of the ‘owners’ or ‘copyright holders’ (publishing houses, institutions that conserve archives, heirs, etc.).
- the public, who are given (as Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe so aptly wrote to me in 1994) not ‘Artaud’ but ‘part of Artaud’. Meaning works that have been formatted and re-formatted to suit editorial and commercial ends. The reading public is led by the nose, since by the silences and pretences of the Affair the media continue to keep it under influence.
THE TREATMENT OF THE MANUSCRIPTS
As for the editorial treatment of Artaud’s manuscript notebooks as it has been done for so many years, by Paule Thévenin, the story is complex and I leave it up to readers to discover how the interests of one party or another have built up a monstrous legend over the years. Clearly, at present Le Monde does not want to shed light on this affair. For reasons of its own that are not conducive to establishing what I persist in calling ‘the truth of the Artaud affair’.
Technically, it would not be very difficult to propose (e.g. via the Internet) a digital version of the Artaud papers. All that is needed is a little willpower, and the time it takes. - There are of course questions of copyright, which are backed (wouldn’t you know) by commercial interests.
Plea for resuscitating the drowned
Open letter (as form demands) to Jean-Louis Jeannelle* and Le Monde des livres. *Writer of the article “L’Affaire Artaud : journal ethnographique de Florence de Mèredieu : Artaud et les jésuites” (11 June 09)
THE BIG LOSERS : ARTAUD AND HIS READERS
As has always been the case in the past sixty years, there are two big losers in this Affair :
- Artaud and his work, which remain under control, under influence, with orthodox books that play into the hands of the ‘owners’ or ‘copyright holders’ (publishing houses, institutions that conserve archives, heirs, etc.).
- the public, who are given (as Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe so aptly wrote to me in 1994) not ‘Artaud’ but ‘part of Artaud’. Meaning works that have been formatted and re-formatted to suit editorial and commercial ends. The reading public is led by the nose, since by the silences and pretences of the Affair the media continue to keep it under influence.
THE TREATMENT OF THE MANUSCRIPTS
As for the editorial treatment of Artaud’s manuscript notebooks as it has been done for so many years, by Paule Thévenin, the story is complex and I leave it up to readers to discover how the interests of one party or another have built up a monstrous legend over the years. Clearly, at present Le Monde does not want to shed light on this affair. For reasons of its own that are not conducive to establishing what I persist in calling ‘the truth of the Artaud affair’.
Technically, it would not be very difficult to propose (e.g. via the Internet) a digital version of the Artaud papers. All that is needed is a little willpower, and the time it takes. - There are of course questions of copyright, which are backed (wouldn’t you know) by commercial interests.
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire